New State Tax to Watch Out For

I received an email from Biznik, explaining why their rates are going up about 10%. Keep an eye out for how many other of your online purchases are about to get another tax:

“Washington State, like many states in today’s economy, is looking hard at areas of ambiguity within their tax code. The state has just enacted legislation that became effective July 26, 2009 clarifying how digital products and services are to be taxed. Electronic downloads of music, movies, and other standard information have always been subject to sales and use tax. However, with the passage of this bill, all digital products and digital automated services will be subject to these taxes. Biznik is classified under the law as a Digital Automated Service (ESHB 2075 section (5)(a) – the newly enacted legislation). Consequently, we are required to collect and remit appropriate sales and use taxes on membership fees for customer’s located in the state.

How does this affect you? 

Biznik’s membership dues fall under the definition of taxable digital automated service. Starting on July 26, 2009, Washington Sales Tax at your local rate will be added to your recurring monthly membership fee.

The sales and use tax in the zip code is 0.095%. Therefore, $0.95 will be added each month to your $10 monthly membership fee.

Thank you for participating in the Biznik community!

Lara Feltin
Biznik Cofounder
lara@biznik.com

 

 

Fun Stats With the MLS

It’s Sunday and about 122 degrees in Seattle, so with time to goof around, I thought I’d do some quick stats analysis on the MLS Playoff race.

In the East, it looks like everyone but New York is still in the hunt, as the other 6 teams have between 21 and 30 points. In baseball terms, that means the 6th place team is 3 games back with 13 to play. So, that’s a pretty close race. In the West, it’s a similar chase, with 5 teams between 27-32 points, and a 6th team lurking with 23. So in the American system, realistically 12 out of 15 teams have chances at 8 Playoff births, so that seems to indicate a pretty nutty race to the finish.

 

 

 

So for fun, let’s say we played the same way as the EPL, and just had everyone racing for the title without a playoff system. On the left is what you would get as you enter the final third of the season. Still a remarkably tight race. Everyone is chasing Houston, but 11 teams are still really within 3 games with 11 or more to play.

So, two questions: 1) Why does the MLS have such a competitive race down the stretch, and 2) How does this compare to a league like the EPL?

Question 1 is interesting. One *could* surmise that the talent is of low enough caliber in general that most of the players are kind of the same. You could also surmise that the hardest thing to do in soccer is score, and the MLS just doesn’t have enough scorers so you see a lot of ties. Another acceptable answer is that in the middle of the season, players are asked to join their National teams for World Cup Qualifying, Confederations Cup or Gold Cup. The best players get picked away, and they are probably on the best teams, so all of a sudden a top team loses two-three starters and gets drubbed a few times.

 

Now let’s compare “Points per Match” between the EPL and MLS. Quite simply, the best teams in EPL win more than the best teams in MLS. Which confirms our theory of a lack of good scorers leading to more ties.

Now, it’s easy for a snobby European to say, “Playoffs have no business in soccer. We use tables and season long standings to decide our league winner.” (Which is true, except they also have an FA Cup Tournament which is really a long playoff, and also, in the lower divisions top 2 records automatically get promoted, but the 3-6th place teams battle in a 4 team playoff to see who else gets to move up.)

While I would ordinarily side on the side of English football and tradition, I have to admit that having the Sounders in the middle of a 6 team race for 4 Playoff spots is pretty exciting. 

However, is the playoff system causing more ties?  Are teams just trying to get a single point in order to be the 8th best team? If that’s the case, maybe the EPL system would be better for the MLS.  So what do you think is better – a league where everyone is in the hunt the last few months of the season, or a league where there is more motivation to get a win instead of a tie, even if it means more teams eliminated earlier?

And That’s The Way It Is

I am woefully late on paying my respects to America’s best loved broadcaster, Walter Cronkite.  So here is a link to the CBS News Tribute Page.  

You have to wonder whether a man like Cronkite would have been as successful in today’s world of lower journalism standards.  Would he have made 2009 journalism better, or would have he been passed over because of his inability to lower himself and do what it takes to get ratings?

I like to think there is a new version of Cronkite mulling around out there, who is going to reinvent broadcasting, and make it once again a place of relevance and respect, not ridicule.  As it is, I hope everyone in the industry has taken a few minutes to reflect back on Cronkite’s career, and what it looked like to report the news without being the news or injecting one’s own views.  

Chelsea v Seattle – What to look for

I’ve been asked a bunch by my non-soccer fans what to expect from today’s friendly vs Chelsea.  Here are a few thoughts about what “success” looks like, in no particular order.

  • A sellout crowd – Weekend afternoons in July are a premium in Seattle, especially sunny 90 degree ones.  So to get 65,000 people to spend one of them watching an exhibition soccer game is a pretty neat feat.
  • Big showing from Supporters Group – This is  really their only chance to impress the European Supporter Groups, so expect the Brougham end to be loud, lead the crowd in some good chants, and have some creative signs.
  • A Chelsea win – After all, they are one of the top 5 or 6 teams in the world.  You’d expect Drogba, Lampard, Anelka, Terry, Essien, Malouda, etc… to put on a pretty good show, even if it is pre-season, and put in a few goals before half.
  • Some good showings from the Sounders – In the 2nd half, it would be great to really see some young Sounders step up agains the young guys from Chelsea.  Look for Montero and Zakuani to really be featured as they try to play themselves into a potential European contract, which would be great fot the MLS.

All told, I think if the Sounders played competitively and went down 2-0 at half, then played a 1-1 or 2-2 tie in the 2nd half vs the Chelsea reserves, everyone would be happy.  The crowd should have a blast, the Sounders will gain some experience, and for one of the first times, a European football team will roll into the U.S. and see this as a potentially fun place to end their careers.  If we see a 38 year old Didier Drogba or Frank Lampard in a Sounders jersey in 5 or 6 years, this may be why.

 

If I Ran the MLS

This seems so easy, I still don’t get why they don’t do it.  The day after the MLB All-Star Game is the only day during the calendar year in which there are no sports on TV.  

This should be the MLS’ biggest TV spectacle of the year.

Every rivalry game should be being played today, all at the same time, all at the stadiums that will have the most fans.  Joe Fan should tune into a pre-game show, then see 90+ minutes of high intensity soccer programming.  With 8 games going on, at an average of 2 goals per game, there should be about 16 goals, or one every 6 minutes.  You can pick one or two games to feature, and then cut in to the other games whenever a goal is scored.  There would be so many highlights, you wouldn’t even have time to go to the fridge.

In fact, if you needed to, you should pay ESPN so you can be on both ESPN and ESPN2 at the same time with different programming, so there is an East Coast game and West Coast Game on live on each channel, so by switching between channels, you get access to 4 games, and highlights from the other 4.

Once that framework is set up, there is really no end to the fun you can have with it. 

If I Ran the MLB All-Star Game

I have 2 requests.  

1) The broadcast crew would NOT be made up of the Fox National Crew.  Fans, press, players or some combination of the three would vote on 3 local crews, each who would do 3 innings of the game.  Or maybe it’s 2 crews that get voted in, and the host team crew.  Or maybe one current crew, a crew of retired guys and the host crew.  You can toy with the details.  But get me a couple of innings of Vin Scully.

2) On each league roster, the longest tenured MLB player who has never mad an All-Star game makes the team.  If you’ve been a backup catcher since 1996, or are a 43 year old left-handed middle relief curveball specialist, well you deserve one chance to see the big stage in your career. 

That’s all I’m really asking for.

A Good Article on Community Stadiums

With the Sounders selling out their entire season, it’s easy to forget that the rest of the MLS is not sharing the same attendance success.

BigSoccer.com has a good article about how Frisco, TX (suburn of Dallas), used their MLS squad as a way to get an entire community complex developed, and how everything works together in a nice synergy.  Perhaps there’s a way to do something similar with a basketball/hockey/concert arena type complex in Seattle? 

A Few Tips for College Grads Looking for Marketing Jobs

In the last few months, thanks mainly to my association with the UW Foster School of Business, I’ve been able to meet with a number of top flight students and recent graduates hunting for jobs in Advertising or Marketing.

I keep seeing a few common themes.  There aren’t that many new marketing jobs out there, many firms who have marketing jobs are cutting people, and many people who currently have these jobs are reinventing themselves so they can keep getting their paychecks.  This does not lead to a simple path to employment for a rookie.

So, as a person at a company who is hiring, not firing, at the current moment, here are a few things from my personal perspective that I think can help you. (Please note: this point of view is not necessarily endorsed by my company and will not necessarily help your resume get through our screeners.  It’s simply my opinion.)

  • If you are going after a job in marketing, first and foremost, you better be able to market yourself.  Think about the 4 P’s and apply them to you.  Your personal “brand” should be packaged professionally, priced appropriately, promoted in the right areas and you should come to the table with the proper set of skills to provide solutions to the problems that job is designed to deal with.
  • Remember that the job opening is there for the benefit of the company, not you.  Some executive, director or hiring manager has a specific and relevant problem that needs to be solved.  It’s not an opening for a “job.”  It’s a call for someone to provide a solution to an outstanding issue.
  • There is no such thing as “menial work” while you search for a career job.  The market stinks.  We get that.  But showing up every day for work at your barista job shows you understand customers.  Working as a deckhand on a fishing boat illustrates that you will work hard.  Spending 20 hours a week donating time to a non-profit proves you have a general interest in learning skills and networking.  Any of those things prove you are scrappy and worth hiring.
  • This environment favors the scrappy.  The Social Media world makes it easy to prove competence in the field you are interested in.  Take side projects, help friends, work on any marketing gig you can find.
  • Start a blog.  It’s free. It takes 20 minutes a day.  Write about anything professional you read and have an opinion on.  If nothing else, it proves you are reading the things I want my employees to know something about.
  • Know all the tools.  Basecamp, Google Docs, Office Live, Twitter, Flickr, Digg, Delicious, Digsby, etc… just know all the online applications that make collaboration easier.
  • Above all, remember there are two type of people who are distinctly different.  There are unemployed people who want a marketing job, and marketing people who aren’t currently employed.  Be the latter.  
  • Finally, for the non-recent grads.  If you are applying for a senior level role in a small firm, come with a book of business, or at leastthe willingness to build one.  Senior people are expensive.  Small firms rarely have a stack of cash sitting around in which to donate to a new person.  Show that you can generate clients, no matter how small, so that you can help the firm justify your senior level paycheck.

I Need a Place to get News

Ok, I’m throwing my hands up in the air.  We have all these sources for “News” but it feels like everyone is just writing Op-Ed pieces.  Is there anyplace where real journalists report real stories, by researching real facts and attaching them to real analysis, all in a single place?

What sent me over the edge, was a snarky blurb on a local Seattle technology pub, which backhandedly complimented Microsoft for “finally” getting a corporate twitter account.  If would have been a perfect opporunity for any of the following stories:

  • How a Fortune 100 decides to build a Twitter Account.
  • An analysis of Microsoft’s individual business units run their Twitter accounts, and the similarieties and differences between them. 
  • Comparison between other other Fortune 500 companies’ use of Twitter.
  • A conversation with the major marketing and advertising agencies about how Twitter is affecting brands.
  • An interview with Starbucks and Alaska Airlines Social Media and or Marketing?PR folks.
  • How companies are profiting from their twitter campaigns.

Instead, we got a few lines about how Microsoft PR is late to the Twitter game, with absolutely no rationale or arguments about why a corporate Twitter account has to be well thought out, or even a list of the potential risks.

Now, I understand stories like the ones I hoped for require research and interviews that go deeper than gettign an email shot to you, and it’s hard to write them while at the bar watching a sporting event.  But where are the journalists who would write stories like this?

So my question:  Where are you guys actually getting real news these days?  What journalism sources are stimulating your brain more than a John Grisham novel?